Unlocking The Potential For East And North East Asian Regional Economic Cooperation And Integration

At the outset, the subregions of East and North-East Asia are more dissimilar than similar, with different stages of development, economic structure and size, political systems and culture. Due to these differences and long standing historical and geopolitical tensions, institutionalized regionalization has not made much progress. Yet, there are increasing interactions and this publication looks into how greater cooperation and integration could offer solutions to not only the old problems of poverty and political instability facing the subregion but also the new challenges posed by economic growth such as emerging income gaps, environmental degradation, urbanization and congestion and various social issues.

This report examines how countries in South Asia could capitalize on opportunities to cooperate for closer regional economic integration, in particular in the four broad areas of trade and market integration, regional connectivity, financial cooperation, and collective actions to address shared risks and vulnerabilities. It reveals that trade barriers, infrastructural deficits and political divergences have cost the sub-region direly in terms of lost opportunities for exports. The report underscores the prospects available for South Asian countries to play a stronger role in broader regionalism in Asia-Pacific as well as discusses the unique role of the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP) in facilitating that process.

Unlocking the Potential of Regional Economic Cooperation and Integration in South Asia

The Northeast Asia Economic Forum (NEAEF) is a regional nongovernmental organization created in 1991 to sponsor and facilitate research, networking, and dialogue relevant to the economic and social development of Northeast Asia. The Forum is also committed to promoting understanding and relations among the peoples of Northeast Asia, North America, and Europe. The main objective is for NEAEF to conduct research and conference activities aimed at functional economic cooperation such as cross-border energy, transportation and logistics infrastructure development, and capital mobilization. The Forum holds annual conferences, workshops, and seminars for planning, facilitating, coordinating, and implementing international and interdisciplinary solutions to common policy problems. It is the only nongovernmental regional organization in which all the nations of Northeast Asia and the US are consistent and active participants. For the year 2014, NEAEF in collaboration with the Korea Institute for International Economic Policy (KIEP), cooperated in efforts toward achieving closer economic and financial cooperation in Northeast Asia, and continued its focus on research, the annual conference, and meetings aimed at financing regional economic integration and establishment of the Northeast Asian Bank for Cooperation and Development (NEABCD). This work aims to promote functional economic cooperation in terms of cross-border resources, energy supplies, infrastructure construction, capital mobilization, and institutional development. NEAEF, as planned for the year 2014, facilitated conference and meeting activities in which experts presented their perspectives, views, ideas, concrete proposals, and strategies relevant to the issues of a regional institution for financial cooperation. This volume, which is the final part of a series of proceedings titled Financing Regional Economic Integration and Functional Preface Contributors Introduction and Overview Statements by Hosts and Country Representatives Part I. Regional Economic Cooperation in Northeast Asia: Country Perspectives - A Korean Perspective (Chang Jae Lee)? - A Chinese Perspective (Zhang Jianping) - A Japanese Perspective (Maeda Tadashi) - A Russian Perspective (Pavel Minakir) Part II: Energy Cooperation: Energy Infrastructure and Physical Connectivity Japan’s Energy Challenges and Potential for Regional Cooperation (Tanabe Yasuo) Energy Issues: Security, Alternative Systems, and Low-Carbon Futures (Terry Surles) Prospects for a Cross-border Power System in Northeast Asia (Iinuma Yoshiki) Energy Cooperation in Northeast Asia: A Russian Perspective (Sergey Sevastianov)

In the 80's the countries of Asia-Pacific had first experienced 'economic miracles'. Then after a short period of stagnation and retrenchment in the 90's, the economic prosperity is again in full swing from the beginning of the 21st century. The major driving force behind this is the rapidly growing economic and technical cooperation among countries (China, Japan, South Korea and Southeast Asian countries) in the region, attributable to liberalization of trade and Free Trade Agreements efforts which is expected to lead to the establishment of a common market like EU. This book is the most comprehensive compendium of expertise about the current economic exchanges and chances of a common market in the Asia-Pacific realm and their perspectives substantiated by case studies.

Until the currency crisis of 1997, East Asia was hailed around the world as a model of economic growth and development. However, when the crisis struck, East Asian countries found themselves struggling without the regional cooperation frameworks that had been established by the other major economic regions of the world. The establishment of a strong East Asian regional cooperation framework has become a vital policy challenge in the post-crisis period. In February 2002 a group of leading Asian economic policy experts came together to discuss the future of East Asian regionalism at the "Co-design for a New East Asia" symposium hosted by the Economic Research Center of Nagoya University. This book brings together the key papers from that symposium and strongly argues the case for an East Asian regionalism while addressing the potential barriers to such a framework. The book is of interest to everyone concerned about the economic future of East Asia in a post-crisis globalized economy.

A Brookings Institution Press and the Research Institute of Economy, Trade, and Industry (Japan) publication East Asian economic integration is on the rise. In the past decade, all of the region's powers have begun negotiating free trade agreements with their neighbors. They are also exploring broader regional options, such as the creation of an East Asian summit or free trade area. These developments have not always been welcomed by observers in other parts of the world. Some fear that they mark a turn away from integration into the global economy and herald the emergence of a closed, inward-looking bloc. In this timely and important book, Naoko Munakata offers an alternative perspective, based on her experience as an economic official and trade negotiator over the past 20 years. East Asian integration, she argues, is not driven by defensiveness or anti-Western sentiment. Instead, it reflects pragmatic calculations of economic interest, as well as a desire for mutual trust and a sense of community. Munakata makes her case by analyzing developments in the region since the mid-1980s, highlighting such important factors as the evolution of Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC), the impact of the 1997–98 Asian financial crisis, and the rise of China. She also outlines possible future scenarios for the region and offers policy prescriptions for building on regionalism's achievements to date. Over the coming decades, the rise of China, its relationship with Japan, and the institutional arrangements that bind those countries to the United States and the countries of East and Southeast Asia will become critical factors in the global balance of power. Transforming East Asia is essential reading for anyone seeking to understand the roots of this transformation.

Northeast Asia, where the interests of three major nuclear powers and the world's two largest economies converge around the unstable pivot of the Korean peninsula, is a region rife with political-economic paradox. It ranks today among the most dangerous areas on earth, plagued by security problems of global importance, including nuclear and missile proliferation. Yet, despite its insecurity, the region has continued to be the most rapidly growing on earth for over five decades—and it is emerging as an identifiable economic, political, and strategic region in its own right. As the locus of both economic growth and political-military uncertainty in Asia has moved further to the Northeast, a need has developed for a book that focuses analytically on prospects for Northeast Asian cooperation within the context of both Asia and the Asia-Pacific regional relationship. This book does exactly that, while also offering a more general theory for Asian institution building.